by M. L. Briers
“Which brings us back to…”
“Doe a deer, a female deer?” she said, wiggling her eyebrows and grinning.
“Huh?” Drew looked lost.
“Old chick flick, don’t hurt yourself thinking on it,” she said, patting his chest as if she was placating a child. “It was about a nun…”
Drew groaned. “Nuns,” he said, shaking his head. “Why are they all called Mary?”
“Seriously?” Viv asked, snorting a chuckle. Drew shrugged. “Because of the Virgin Mary…”
“God’s mum?”
Viv snorted a chuckle. “Jesus’ mother…”
“But how is she a virgin?”
Viv grimaced. “I’m a little loose on that part, but apparently there was no s-e-x,” she whispered, shrugging.
“Explain that part again…”
“Do you really need a talk on the birds and the bees because…”
“Yeah, fine, I get that part,” he lied. He was still none the wiser. “But … why do they all look like penguins?”
“I’m guessing, and it is only a guess, that it’s like a dark wedding dress or something,” Viv said, stumped. She made a mental note to ask Sister Mary the next time she saw her and hoped it wouldn’t offend her.
“Who’d they marry?”
“God – I think,” Viv said, scowling.
“That’s … huh?” Drew looked constipated.
“Weren’t we doing something?” Viv said, trying to get off the subject of the nuns and back onto the reason he’d carried her to the bedroom in the first place.
“We need to talk to Sister Mary?” he said, and Viv raised her eyebrows. She guessed they were right back to the nuns once more.
“Now?”
Drew turned his full attention back to his mate. She wiggled her eyebrows at him and offered him the kind of wicked look that made him growl once more. “Maybe later.”
“Good choice,” Viv said. Drew dipped his head and went to claim her lips, but she slapped both hands against his chest once more, and he groaned. “Hold that thought – and don’t groan, you started this,” she said, berating him with another scowl.
“Fine, thought held, but not for long so make it quick…”
“Hopefully you’re not going to do the same,” she said, brightly grinning her mischief-making at him, and when he cocked just the one eyebrow at her, she snorted a chuckle. “Moving on…”
“Wish you would…”
“Why do we need to talk to the nuns?”
“Not the nuns, that Mary nun…”
“They’re all Mary nuns…”
“The Mary-Mary nun, the giggly one…”
“Sister Mary-Mary, we call her Happy,” Viv said, nodding.
“I don’t want another conversation with Attila the Nun, that woman is scary,” Drew said.
“Yeah,” Viv said, chuckling. “We call her Grumpy, and the other one is Bashful.”
“And what was your nickname when you were wearing the penguin suit?”
“Choosey,” Viv said, not missing a beat. “And I chose you.”
“I knew you had good taste…”
“Don’t let that ego land it might squish me,” Viv said.
“You know what?” Drew said and then took her lips before either of them could have another thought about nuns or anything else.
CHAPTER THREE
~
Jorge’s wolf rose up within him at the hard sting of the witch’s magic. He was naked, and in danger of shifting should the need arise, and he had a feeling that faced with the crazy witch, that need might come sooner than expected. “You attacked me?” he said, growling and eyeing the witch as if he was expecting snakes to suddenly start sprouting from her dark hair.
“Attacked?” Nancy asked, snorting a little chuckle of disbelief. “Ah, did the big bad man get a little boo-boo and now he needs to go cry to his big, bad alpha?” she babied him, even pouting and looking sad, and that only rubbed salt in the wounds of his ego.
Then she snapped on a bright, mischievous grin and that only riled Jorge up another notch. The witch was asking for retaliation. The only problem was – he didn’t hurt women, but then she was also a witch, he reasoned, trying to find a loophole in that stupid DNA protection switch of his.
Nope, that didn’t wash either. Neither man nor beast could do it. “Witch, you’re biting off more than you can chew,” he said, his top lip curling and a hearty rumble of a growl warning her of things to come should she persist.
“Says the wolf,” she said, snorting a hearty chuckle right back at him.
“Are you crazy?” he asked, with a look of pure disbelief. “Do you really want to go toe-to-toe with me?” he asked, pointing to his muscled chest, and Nancy kicked herself for letting her gaze follow where he led it and looking at those rippling muscles.
Yum – noooo! Not yum, not even, hmm, she berated herself.
The man was a shifter and shifters were off limits because … oh, no – what was she even doing talking to the man? She could be a mate – not to him because if he were one of the Seven Dwarfs, he’d be Dopey and Grumpy all rolled into one, but the fact remained – she was fraternizing with the enemy when she should have been hightailing it out of town.
And where was the damn cat?
“I want nothing to do with you, you man-beast,” she said, curling her top lip with contempt and disdain for him and his kind.
They’d already lost one good witch to their tribe; she wasn’t about to become the next victim to a male chauvinistic, thick-headed, beast of an ego ridden dumb-butt numb-nut.
“Man-beast?” Jorge snorted a chuckle. “Witch, you have no idea,” he said, growling a warning at her just to make his point, and because that was the one thing he could do without his wolf getting all riled up and protectionist on him.
Don’t eat the witch! Don’t eat the witch! Pah! She probably didn’t taste that good anyway.
Although, she did have curves that … nope, that wasn’t going to fly. No damn witches!
“Wolf-boy, you were born without a clue, and you’ve spent your life much the same way,” she said, motioning for him to leave. “Move on; my patience is wearing thin.”
Jorge fisted his big hands at his sides and chewed on that one as he pressed his lips together until they were white, and the curse words queued up in his brain. Oh, but he’d love to scare the pants off her! And that thought led to another, that led to another, and that led to his length getting a little harder.
“Oh-my-Goddess!” Nancy exclaimed, her eyes drawn to the sight of his man-bits lamely waving at her. “Serious-bloody-ly?” she demanded, fisting her hands at her sides, mirroring his stance, but not by choice, and screwing up her face in disgust.
Jorge snapped to attention. If ever there was a time to will the mini-beast down it was now. It was just a shame that part of him had a mind of its own. “Not a reflection of what I think of you,” he snapped.
“Just can’t control it, ha?” she snapped back, wrinkling her nose. “Let me help you with that, you pervert!”
“Pervert…” he growled, but there was no time for him to tell her exactly what he thought of her because she was already raising her hands, and she zapped him again, and that time – boy, did he feel it?
Every muscle, every sinew in his body felt as if they’d been stretched to the limit until he thought they might just snap. His legs felt like jello, quivering beneath him until finally, they gave way.
His eyes would have widened in surprise had they not been narrowed into dark slits as his face twisted in pain, and he dropped to his knees on the ground before falling flat on his face in the dirt. Thud!
Damn, that witch was a mean one! His beast was snarling, growling, and clawing within him to be unleashed on her curvy backside, but there wasn’t a damn thing that either of them could do – except lay there motionless.
To add insult to injury, from the corner of his eye, Jorge saw her pointy little boots come into view, facing his way. H
e wanted to look her in the eye, glare at her, but he couldn’t move his damn head.
“That’s right, you take a break, have a rest, and sniff the poop you’ve been chatting, you over-sexed ball of fur,” Nancy said, pleased with herself for dealing with his pervy little self. “The next time you mess with a witch, just remember, unlike you, we don’t take things lying down,” she said, and with a big dollop of glee, she unleashed her magic on his backside like the sting of a wet towel.
Then Nancy turned on her heels and stalked away from him. Leaving her troubles behind her as she went in search of her cat.
~
Jorge didn’t need to hit the ground running because he knew that little witch couldn’t be that far away. She might have knocked him down and put him out of action for a little while, but she hadn’t done any real damage to keep his body from healing fast and shaking off her magic.
That was her first mistake. Her second mistake was making him drag in a pained breath through his nose, and now that he had her scent and could use it to track her down.
Not that he needed anything as potent as a scent in the air – the woman had a footfall like an elephant as she stomped around the woods, and she kept making little sucking noises. There were also a fair few curse words that she liked to repeat on a loop.
Nope, he definitely didn’t need his wolf senses to track her, just a regular pair of ears.
Jorge was going to enjoy giving her a piece of his mind when he caught up to her. But there was still the little problem of her magic to get around. He certainly didn’t want to be face down in the dirt again, but needs must, and he had a need to tell her what was what.
Jorge hurdled the big rotting trunk of an old tree with ease, and when his feet hit the ground on the other side, the noise startled the wicked witch. He saw her shoulders tense and go up around her ears, saw her hands clench into little fists at her side, and watched as she slowly pivoted around to glare at him.
That was a satisfying feeling, but the little squeak of annoyance that got caught in the back of her throat was the cherry on top of the cake. “Admit it,” Jorge said, half-playful and half-miffed off. “You missed me.”
Nancy’s top lip twitched and then curled as her gaze darted around the area like she was looking for a door out of there. “Can you not get it into your thick head that you…?”
“Shouldn’t have used your magic against me, witch. It was a bad move that backfired on you in so many ways,” Jorge said, not daring to take a step towards her until he’d said his piece just in case she had a mind to use her magic again.
“Oh, why don’t you take your little-deflated ego and do one?” Nancy said, folding her arms and rolling her eyes, while she calculated how to put him down for longer to make her real escape this time.
Obviously, stumbling around the woods looking for her cat was a no-no while he was stalking around in the altogether, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t flee the scene and wait for Shrek to leave.
“Do one what?” Jorge asked, frowning.
“A jig,” she said, sarcasm dripping from her tone.
Jorge mirrored her stance and folded his large arms across his broad muscled chest, noting the way her gaze flicked down to take a look. Busted. “Oh, I have nothing to do a jig about, but who knows? Maybe soon.”
“Coincidence, me too,” Nancy said, a sparkling of mischief in her eyes that made his heart skip a beat in worry that she was going to zap him before he said his piece. “The day you’re little booties are pointing towards the sky, six feet under, and…”
“Now, sugar, is that any way to speak to your mate?” Jorge said and enjoyed the moment. Not the fact that he had a witch for a mate – a crazy, wicked witch – but the sheer look of horror and recognition of his words that spread across her face.
“H-huh?” Nancy wanted to slap herself upside the head and stick her fingers in her ears to fish those words back out. He was obviously joking – fate couldn’t be that cruel – could it?
A wolf shifter mate was bad enough, but not exactly the end of the world, after all, Viv had survived it. But him…? Mr Tall, D-umb, and G-rowly with the personality of a wet mop? That was taking revenge on her for a misdemeanour in a previous life too bloody far.
“Oh, selective hearing?” Jorge asked, giving her a sympathetic look, but still not daring to take that first step. She was a zapper, but worse than that; she was a runner, he could see it in her eyes. That little witch of his was thinking about it. “I thought it was the elders that had that.”
“Elders …? What?” Nancy was still trying to wrap her head around the prospect of having anyone as a mate – especially him!
If this wasn’t some kind of a sick joke … well, she didn’t know what she would do, but she wasn’t going to stand for it. In fact, her legs were kind of wobbly and sitting down might have been the way to go.
“I can see you’re fighting the need to run into my arms…”
“Your … Ugh!” Nancy’s face twisted into a look of disgust.
Okay, so he had nice muscled arms, and she might have been curious to poke those biceps and see just how packed they were, but … Ugh!
Jorge found himself rather enjoying the moment. Who said finding a witch mate couldn’t be fun?
She was at sixes and sevens, floundering in a sea of – ‘oh my God’ – and he felt like it was justice for that zap that he’d never be able to get his own back on her for. He leant his upper body in towards her. “The urge a little too much for you?”
“To puke? Yeah!” she snapped back, dropping her arms to her sides and noting the way his eyed narrowed with suspicion. “Scared of getting zapped?” she asked with a teasing smirk that irked him but bolstered her backbone just a little.
“Nope.”
“Don’t think I’d do it? Your overinflated ego writing cheques the rest of you can’t cash?” she asked, and that sparkle of mischief was back in her eyes.
Jorge’s beast bristled at that, but he was unperturbed. “I have no doubt…”
“Wouldn’t want to disappoint you,” she said, biting down on the urge to blast the sucker into tomorrow. She was already raising her hands by the time her words hit his brain, and he realised what was coming.
Nancy flicked one hand on her wrist and flipped him down onto his backside on the ground. Not to feel left out, she used her other hand to zap him a good one.
“That’s…” Jorge bit out through the pain to his pride.
He wasn’t sure if the pain was more or less intense than the last blast of her magic, but his muscles were definitely locked up again, and his wolf was practically drooling on itself laughing at him. But at the sight of the witch turning on her heels and running off as fast as her feet could carry her, his beast soon changed its tune.
“Cat be damned – I’m outta here!” Nancy tossed back over her shoulder.
There were a few things she knew – if she stayed in Knowing, then she was up poop creek without a paddle. Her cat would find its way to a witch’s back door, and she’d send for it later. And she had one chance to make it to her car and escape out of town before Mr No-Pants got back up.
Life was too short to spend it shackled to a big growly beast of a man – that wasn’t the life for her.
CHAPTER FOUR
~
Sister Mary-Mary knew that curiosity killed the cat, and yet she couldn’t help but take her morning walk through the woods to where the witches lived. One witch, in particular, Vivelle, gave her that annoying itch and scratch of wonderment inside her, and it was bubbling away like a witch’s cauldron to know what was going on.
There was no chance that the witch in question hadn’t mated with Drew unless there was another witch that had found her mate, but then she was sure she would have heard about it on the outer-town grapevine of the supernatural world. No, she’d heard that mating howl when she’d walked home with Sister Margaret. But, she just wanted to check that all was right with the world, or at least, with her friend.
Of course, as with all good witches, zapping had ensued, and now Nancy was off and running through the woods towards home like a startled, but determined rabbit. Sister Mary watched her go from her makeshift hiding place behind a large tree trunk and sneaked a peek around it as best she could.
Boy, could that witch run! Nut then, Sister Mary supposed she’d run too if she’d just zapped a wolf shifter.
Could it be that another pair of mates had found each other? Sister Mary giggled like a schoolgirl at the thought of it. More mates, more forever love, how exciting a prospect!
“Oh no,” Sister Mary muttered, frowning when she snatched her attention back to the shifter, who was trying to drag his body up from the leaves but didn’t seem to be able to accomplish the task. “She’s getting away,” she whispered to herself.
Something in the tree line on the opposite side of the woods caught her attention, and she narrowed her gaze as if that would make things clearer and suddenly give her binocular vision. It looked like – or maybe not – could it be Delta, the elder witch?
She had to wonder what the woman was doing out in the woods, and then remembered that she was out in the woods and wasn’t one to question anyone else’s motives.
“I should go…” she said, and yet, she couldn’t seem to make her feet move or drag herself away. Curiosity might have killed the cat, but she wanted to know what happened next. “Just one more minute.”
~
Delta rolled her eyes to the sky and sighed a deep breath that she’d draw in back out in exasperation. That new shifter pack was nothing but trouble, as she’d known it would be, but would anyone listen? But mates? Well, that was something she hadn’t figured into the equation, not really.